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[Not Another Cinderella Story Masterlist] • [Membership Stories]
The bakery was already in full motion, and it wasn’t even nine in the morning.
Outside the tall windows, a line of tourists blocked the sunlight from peaking through while conversation and happy laughter filled the space, burying the sound of the jazz music from the atmosphere.
Miriam’s uniform was sticking to her body, a result of the heat from the kitchen and all the walking around the main room. She was the first contact most people had with Maison du Lavien, and she wanted them to feel as welcome as possible. Most people only had one opportunity to have breakfast at the oldest and only bakery in Tudal, and she wanted to make their wait more than worth it. Still, all she did had a rhythm, a purpose, and she couldn’t break it. As much as she greeted every customer with a smile, that didn’t mean she was willing to spend more than two minutes chatting with them. She had to keep moving, had to keep going back and forth, all while hoping people would leave their tables after their meal.
They rarely did.
It wasn’t just the delicious baked goods and pastries that made Maison du Lavien such a hit spot. The building remained pretty much unaltered since its construction, its ceilings carved in beautiful flower motifs that rounded around the tall white columns around the space. According to historical records, this had been one of the royal family’s favourite spots in the 50s and 60s, which resulted in an array of photos on the wall of the old King and Queen when they visited with their son, now King Raoul II.
Even if the royal family no longer frequented the establishment, the allure of a possible encounter with them lured people inside. Everyone loved to feel like a part of history, loved to visit important places that marked a generation. For a lot of these tourists, Maison du Lavien was that.
For Miriam, this place paid her salary, and that was that.
Long ago, she was just as excited as the faces she saw around the place. But after working here for the past five years, all of the glamour and appeal of working at such a prestigious place had faded. Now, this was just another job, one with higher stakes than all the others she had.
It also helped that it was her favourite because of the magic that happened in the kitchen.
As she did her rounds in the main room asking customers how their order was, she spotted two young boys as they entered the bakery, both walking to an empty booth in the corner while pushing one another to try and make each other trip.
Miriam glanced at her watch discreetly while an old gentleman went over how delicious and fluffy his pancakes were, and how the interior decoration was absolutely gorgeous. She smiled. It was true. The decoration was also one of her favourite parts of Maison du Lavien.
Once the man returned to the conversation happening around his table, Miriam excused herself and walked to the booth in the corner, ignoring if any customer called her name or required her assistance. She shouldn’t take long with these two.
“You’re both late,” she said as soon as she approached and two pairs of green eyes fell on her. “Did you fall asleep again?”
“No,” Elliot, the younger one, said, glaring at the boy in front of him. “Oscar just took too long in the bathroom.”
Oscar rolled his eyes, sticking his tongue out to his younger brother. “I needed to get properly ready today.”
“Yeah,” Elliot rolled his eyes, “I noticed you didn’t stink today.”
The cutlery clattered on the table as Elliot yelped after Oscar kicked him from under the table. Miriam took a deep breath and glanced around the different tables, hoping no one had noticed what was happening. She should seriously start asking her younger brothers to enter through the back door if they were going to misbehave like this every single time.
They didn’t deserve this booth.
“First of all,” Miriam said, focusing on Oscar, “if you want to drown yourself in perfume, the last thing you could do is let Elliot go first. And secondly, stop kicking him. You’re in public.”
“What about it?” Oscar crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow at her. “You’re going to tell my mom about it? She won’t punish me, you know.”
“I know. But I could get fired. And if I get fired, these free breakfasts end, and then you’ll have to eat cornflakes with milk in an ugly bowl first thing in the morning for the rest of your life.”
“That sounds scary,” Elliot said, scrunching his nose. “I don’t like milk. It tastes bad.”
“You like it when it has chocolate,” Miriam said, and he nodded in agreement. She pointed at him. “And you, Elliot, if you know Oscar takes a long time in the bathroom, maybe wake up earlier than him. I know it’s not ideal, but we all need to compromise somehow.”
Elliot pondered for a while, a soft pout forming on his lips as he nodded, displeased. Miriam sighed in relief. Out of the two, he was the easiest one to convince, but she wasn’t sure how long this would last. By tomorrow morning, this would all be back to what it was, and they would be bickering about something else, probably the colour of someone’s socks or the sound of the other’s alarm.
Oscar and Elliot were rarely on the same page, and when they were, it wasn’t a good sign.
“I’m going to get your plates, but you have to eat fast today, okay? This is very crowded and Paul is doing me a favour by letting you guys eat here. Can you do that for me?”
“If you’d like,” Oscar said, leaning back on his cushioned seat, “we could even take the food and leave. No need to have breakfast here in the middle of all these people.”
“I’m not letting you out of my sight without knowing you two ate breakfast,” she said. “I am not budging on that.”
“I don’t get why,” Oscar said, rolling his eyes. “You just like ruining my plans with my friends.”
“We’re not getting into this now, Oscar.” Miriam glanced at them both and shook her head. “Please, try not to kill each other while I go to the kitchen.”
They didn’t say anything. Instead, Oscar stared straight at Elliot who focused on the hands on his lap, bouncing his legs to pass the time.
Miriam pursed her lips and took a deep breath, putting back her polite smile. She quickly slid into the kitchen, the heat of working ovens and warm pans slapping onto her cheeks and leaving a mark.
“Oscar and Elliot are here. I’m going to get their breakfast,” she said as she approached one of the men furthest in the back. He gave her a thumbs-up before focusing back on the pastry he was carefully cutting and rolling into croissant shapes.
“I left it at the usual spot,” Paul said. “They’re a bit more burnt than usual.”
“How burnt?” she asked, concerned. She knew Paul let her siblings have breakfast here for free on the condition that they would eat some of the food that wasn’t good enough to serve to customers but not bad enough to justify throwing away. “Do I need to get them something else to eat?”
Paul didn’t answer. He kept cutting and folding, a methodical process that was almost second nature to him. Everyone in this kitchen worked similarly, doing the same task they always did, in the same order they always had. This was something Miriam didn’t envy, but she couldn’t deny she missed it.
Nearby, someone placed two plates on the counter, their dark eyes burning into her.
“If you’re not doing anything here, the least you can do is let us work,” Levi said, wiping his hands on a kitchen towel he then put over his shoulder. “What are you waiting for? Leave.”
Miriam rolled her eyes and grabbed both of the plates, using her back to push the door open before stepping into the main room and joining her siblings back in the booth. She put both plates down, taking a good look at them. The croissants– or what Miriam assumed were supposed to be croissants– weren’t burned. They were closer to being charred.
“What the hell is that?” Oscar asked, picking up one of the corners of the croissant with his fingers. “Are we dogs or something?”
“Should I eat this?” Elliot asked, his eyes pleading. He tried to squish the croissant but it didn’t move. “I think it’s too hard for me to eat.”
She gulped, staring down at the plates, as anger boiled inside of her. Miriam grabbed both of the plates, her jaw clenched as she stared down at her siblings. “Stay here,” she said. “I’m going to bring you breakfast. It will probably be toast, but at least, it won’t be burned.”
Miriam returned to the kitchen and threw the croissants away on the first trash can she saw, before she walked to the backroom, grabbed an apron from her locker and returned to the kitchen. Before she could think, she was fixing her bun, washing her hands up to her elbows and grabbing the flour, milk, sugar and eggs from their spots.
In a bowl, she mixed her batter, starting with dry and then adding the other ingredients. Once the batter was how she liked it, she tasted it, and added some vanilla extract, tasting it once more.
She used the back stove, the one that was too old to be efficient, and after placing a pan on top of it, she made pancakes.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Levi snarled as soon as he spotted her back in the kitchen. “Your place is out there serving those people. Not here, you fool.”
She ignored him. Miriam grabbed two plates from the nearby shelf and added the pancakes onto one of them, preparing the next batch.
Levi reached his arm to grab one of the plates, but she held his wrist, gripping him in place.
“If you think you’re going to throw good food away, think twice. If you’d like, ask your father to deduct this from my salary. I’m not letting my siblings leave this place without something in their stomachs.”
“I’m going to ask, no I am going to demand that he fires you,” Levi said in between his teeth. With her free hand, Miriam turned the pancakes around with her spatula. He tried to let go of her grip, but she didn’t let him go. Not until both dishes were ready. Not until she knew he wouldn’t do anything reckless. “And when he does, you’ll have nowhere to go.”
“Yes.” She nodded as her stomach tied in a knot. “You’re right about that. And would that make you feel good about yourself?”
She turned off the stove and after the two plates had enough pancakes on them, she let go of his wrist and grabbed them, moving away from him to protect them with her life if she had to.
“Here, I am a waitress, Levi,” she said. “I’m not coming for your job if that’s what you’re worried about. And next time, instead of being petty maybe be a decent human being. That way I won’t occupy your kitchen.”
Under Levi and Paul’s heavy gaze, she exited the kitchen again, taking a deep breath once she was outside. She wasn’t sure how long she had taken, but she hoped it would allow Oscar and Elliot to have breakfast, still. If they were late to school, she would take the blame this time.
“Here.” She smiled at them and placed the pancakes on the table. She noticed they each had a glass of warm chocolate milk already. “I made you pancakes.”
“They let you cook for us?” Oscar asked, licking his lips as he stared at his food.
Elliot was nodding in approval as he savoured his breakfast. “Your pancakes arethebest!”
“They’re good, I guess,” Oscar said with his mouth full, shoving some more inside.
“Well, enjoy your breakfast. And if you don’t eat everything, take them with you. I don’t want you to waste food.”
“Okay,” Elliot said with a moustache of milk over his upper lip. “See you later, Miriam.”
“Enjoy your day at school.” She focused her attention back on Oscar. “And no skipping classes, do you hear me? Or next time, I’ll force you to eat a burnt croissant.”
Oscar rolled his eyes, avoiding looking at her. That meant he had heard her message loud and clear. She walked closer to Elliot and ruffled his curls before kissing his cheek. He frowned and pushed her away, ignoring her for his pancakes, eating them like there was no tomorrow.
She quickly returned to the back room and dropped her apron in her locker. In the privacy and quiet of the staff room, she allowed herself three minutes of self-pity before fixing her uniform and her hair, training her features into a polite smile.
When she returned to the main room, she dove back into her usual tasks, greeting customers with happy smiles and pleasant greetings, all while the world around her was quickly falling apart at her feet.
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